


you have come by way of sorrow (you have come by way of tears)

by Roccolinde



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, The Month In Winterfell (and beyond), canon divergent from mid-8x04, slightly less smutty smutty character study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-06 10:10:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20289736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roccolinde/pseuds/Roccolinde
Summary: A character study through a series of (mostly smutty) snippets of Brienne and Jaime's time in Winterfell, with bonus canon divergence. A companion piece to(every single one of us) still left in want of mercy.





	you have come by way of sorrow (you have come by way of tears)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [(every single one of us) still left in want of mercy](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20032558) by [Roccolinde](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roccolinde/pseuds/Roccolinde). 

> So I wrote [(every single one of us) still left in want of mercy](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20032558) a few weeks back, and and hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that there is a second story in it, from Brienne’s perspective and dealing with Gwen’s comment about how season 8 explores Brienne’s needs and desires. And since I was away from home and not able to focus on the next chapter of _in the wild blue yonder_ (which, I should have an update on that soon as well, like maybe middle of the week?), I wrote this and then debated posting because it's not necessarily as technically and emotionally good as Jaime's version of the story. But I **do** feel strongly about Brienne making choices, so I'm posting it anyway. 
> 
>   
Title comes from [By Way of Sorrow](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Axq0UYPFRoA) by The Wailing Jennys, because I might as well stick with the theme.

Brienne has spent too many years apologising for her desires; she is sorry to be too big, too ugly, too strong. She is sorry to yearn for love, she is sorry to yearn for glory. She hides when she can, behind a helm or behind indifference, and it works, but not in the way she intends. 

And now she has faced the end of the world and an army of dead men and lived to see the dawn, and for that she is very much not sorry. She’s not sorry she’s taken Jaime Lannister to bed in the aftermath, and she’s not sorry that he is still there when the sun arrives. (If he had been gone, if it had been one night, she would not have been sorry for that either.)

“Good morning,” she says softly. “I’m pleased you stayed.”

He reaches up and brushes the hair from her temple, and there is a softness in his eyes that she dares to name. 

“So am I,” he says. “You’re much prettier in daylight.”

And while he might be in love with her (she’s so very in love with him), that is an _appalling_ attempt at flirtation. She stares at him for a moment, mouth agape, then begins to laugh. 

“No light or lack thereof can help your personality,” she counters, delighted when his smile broadens. 

“Such discourtesy from a knight!” 

And then they are both laughing, free and alive, and she realises how very easy it is to have what she desires, when what she desires is something this _real_. 

Brienne is tired of being sorry. 

*

He had stayed til morning, but Brienne is not certain he will come to her again. Or rather how he might, now that the humming fog of battle has begun to lift from Winterfell’s corridors and propriety will reassert itself. The idea of asking is laughable, the idea of trying to seduce him even more so, but when evening falls and it is time to seek her bed it is surprisingly easy; she rises and he rises and she asks him to escort her, and she returns Tyrion’s knowing look with a placid smile, because it does not _matter_ what he thinks, not when Jaime acquiesces and offers an arm to escort her properly and she rolls her eyes because she might be a swooning maiden in this story but she’s still _Brienne_ and can walk just fine, and they exchange a knowing look of their own. 

He kisses her at the door, a sweet, chaste brush of lips that demands nothing more of her, not yet. 

“We can wait,” he says, the words tentative and warm, and she bows her head to kiss him more thoroughly. She does not need his promises so long as she has him, but he offers them anyway and she loves him a little more.

“I see no reason to,” she murmurs in reply, opening the door and pulling him through, her fingers already on the ties of his shirt.

*

The fire is golden and warm against her naked skin, and she draws herself to full height. She knows what she looks like, and while it has taken many years, she is grateful for it—there is strength in the breadth of her shoulders, power in every muscle, a story in every scar. It is an imperfect body, but it is _hers_ and she would take no other. But there is still a small voice that reminds her this is the first time he has seen her like this, with no softening of fever or drink or lust, and wonders whether he would prefer all those feminine things she lacks. 

But there is only gentle hunger on his face as he takes her in his arms, as his lips find tender places to kiss.

“Magnificent,” he whispers against her skin.

She laughs, an instinctual defense, but she likes it, more than she would pretty words of her beauty, and exposes her throat so he can kiss there too.

*

Sex is not what she expects. It is not an obligation to be borne nor an absently mechanical action to sate a physical need. It is intimacy and trust and pleasure, the familiarity of another person's body. It is a fight and a dance and a proclamation, written in the red of flushes and lovingly administered bruises. It is so much more than she could ever have imagined, but mostly it is _fun_. 

It is fun to press him against a wall, and it is fun to grasp his hair and tug it lightly until his mouth falls open, and it is fun to capture his moans with her mouth. It is fun to bump foreheads in their haste, to laugh until tears roll down their cheeks. Fun to wake to the feel of flesh on flesh and know, with bone deep certainty, that this is what she wants. What she is allowed to have.

*

He goes drinking with Tyrion the night before the army is to leave for King’s Landing, but catches her in the corridor before he does. His body is close and he tilts his head up so his lips are closer, but he doesn’t make that final move to bridge the distance and so she does, a familiar sort of kiss and then an admonishment to have a good time and do try not to drink to excess because it is too damn cold for her to go retrieve him in the dark. He laughs and drifts away.

He is not laughing when he returns, silently slipping into her bed, his fingers against hers the only contact.

“Our dear sister has decided all is forgiven and demands his return,” Tyrion whispers to her as goodbyes are said. “He says he won’t go…”

“He won’t go alone,” she promises, because it is the only promise she can make. 

He reaches for her in the middle of the night and she comes, silently reminding him of where he is; she cannot keep him where he does not wish to be, but he holds her atop him tightly.

“Too heavy?” she whispers when they have both found their pleasure, nuzzling his neck.

“If you were lighter, I might float away,” he replies, his voice hoarse, and she kisses the tears from his cheeks.

*

She knows what is whispered about this position—it’s for whores, that it matters not what a woman looks like when she is on all fours—but she thinks the speakers have never been here, every steady stroke hitting just right, fingers scrambling for purchase against the fur bedding, a desperate wail building in the back of her throat. And then there’s a brush of lips against her spine and she shatters, shaking and screaming and liquid fire rolling through her. 

She’s only vaguely aware as he pulls away, laughing as he falls beside her. Strokes her still sensitive skin, kisses wherever he can reach. Touches her cheek to turn her face towards him.

“Magnificent,” he says, as he often does.

“Yes,” she agrees, because it truly was.

*

She feels the minute he wants to leave, or feels he should—he holds her a little more desperately, and she lets every scratch, every bite, every press of fingertips against flesh say what she can’t quite yet. _Stay, stay, stay with me, stay here Jaime please, you don’t need to die when you can stay_. Touches him in ways that make him shudder and gasp and whimper pleas against her mouth, stores the sensations deep in her heart for the moment she can no longer keep him, and then touches him again. 

She will not not admit defeat so easily.

*

Her touches buy them time; a day, then two, and a whole sennight has gone the night he is not in her bed when she wakes. Her hand snakes out to touch the sheets, the memory of warmth still caught beneath the furs; she opens her eyes and sees him before the fire and she _knows_, she knows the thoughts that furrow his brow and the voice in his head that demands he leaves. And so it has come to this.

“They’ll destroy the city, you know they will,” she says, climbing from the bed. “But if we’re to go, we should leave now.”

These extra days, few though they were, have given her the words that had so long eluded her. They are not, to her surprise, a confession of love or a reminder of all the reasons he does not deserve to share Cersei’s fate; she still feels those words, for they are true, but what she says is simply that he will not go alone. 

“No,” he says, stirring from the fireside, a small, pained smile on his face. “No, we’ll stay. Come to bed.”

He takes her hand and holds her close and whispers promises against her skin, and (though it pains them both, knowing the cost) he stays. 

*

War ends and spring comes, and beneath the new green leaves she kisses him. 

“Marry me,” she says. 

He laughs. (He laughs so easily these days.)

“This very moment, if you wish it,” he promises, his lips brushing her throat.

And she has spent so many years apologising for her desires, hiding them. Desire for love and friendship and a cause to fight for, desire to be seen without revulsion, desire to _be_.

She is sorry no longer. 


End file.
